Large-scale modern data centers can have hundreds of equipment racks filled with switches, network appliances and computing nodes, connected by thousands of cables, cumulatively spanning many miles. Maintaining the infrastructure in such a data center poses major challenges, not the least of which is the difficulty of ensuring that all cables are and remain properly connected, and identifying and repairing connectivity faults when they occur.
A number of means have been proposed to support automatic identification of cables by the equipment to which they are connected. For example, some types of cable terminations may contain a memory chip, such as an EEPROM chip, in which identifying information is stored in a fashion that can be read automatically by the connected equipment. This sort of facility is specified, inter alia, by the Quad Small Form Factor Pluggable (QSFP) interconnect standard, in which an EEPROM in the transceiver module within the connector at the end of the cable contains information regarding the cable, including an optional serial number assigned by the vendor.
Cable identification information may also be fixed to the end of the cable in a manner that can be read externally. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 8,010,999 describes a cable installation support and management system, in which each worker downloads operation information, to support operations on cables authorized for use, onto a portable terminal carried by the worker. The operation information is associated in advance with cable identification information and is provided by a server. Using a reading device of the portable terminal, the worker reads cable identification information from a cabling data card, such as an RFID tag or a printed barcode, that is attached to the end of a cable. Based on the cable identification information, the worker acquires operation information about the appropriate cable from the downloaded operation information and displays the acquired operation information on the display device of the portable terminal.
As another example, U.S. Patent Application Publication 2008/0314979 describes a cable management system in which machine-readable labels are applied to cable connectors and chassis component connectors. In order to monitor connectivity of cabling, the machine-readable labels on a cable connector and a chassis component to which the cable connector is connected are scanned, and the scanned connectivity information is recorded.